Mozart never finished the score to the Requiem mass. The story of how it was finally finished is a drama itself. See this history. **What is important here is that others picked up the mantle to finish it and ultimately this work was performed and now lives across the planet as hope in the face of death.
I leave this with readers who mourn the loss of our democratic principles in the election of Donald Trump and the rise of autocracy in the USA.
I am broken-hearted on this day, November 6, 2024. But, I will not yield to oppressive forces in my homeland. Our Constitution is truth manifest. These are times when Americans have faltered in their discernment of what the 2024 election means for the American experiment. God help us.
Timothy Snyder, author of On Tyranny and most recently Freedom, offers a Substack message about the moguls and news agencies “Obeying in Advance” – in anticipation of a dictator coming to power.
It is the lowest form of behavior, to cower in the belief that a dictator will reek havoc on you and your business interests for your political position. That has made our nation smell very bad. Our body politic reeks of cowardice and self aggrandizement today as we witness the cowering of our news agencies and people with too much money and power, kneel to the dictator. We have not learned from the 20th Century which documents how Hilter and the Nazi movement came to power.
Jeff Bezos (billionaire owner of Amazon and The Washington Post) decided the paper will not endorse Kamala Harris as promised. In that, he has lent his endorsement to a dictator promising retribution, destruction of our democratic government, promises to support the rich and powerful, and head honcho for a right-wing, Christian nationalism movement building over the last decade with the emergence of a man not fit to be our President.
The Washington Post not endorsing Harris and Walz to remain neutral right when the nation teeters on the knife edge of tyranny is a massive error of judgement. Anticipation of retribution: what a cowardly lot you all are.
Americans, drink your coffee and stand in front of a mirror. Do you want to be ruled by powerful megawealthy and people who purport to care about you but don’t give a damn in reality?
Let them eat cake! Echoes from history are not whispering today, they are shouting! The news agencies turning their backs on you and your family to be “neutral” or to endorse a vindictive man with no regard for the American Republic, let alone understanding of what it is, will regret their action. History will record it. But there will be decades of suffering before it ends.
Adding this message from the Editor of the Guardian today, 10-26-24:
Katharine Viner, editor-in-chief
What does the richest man on the planet really want from a Donald Trump victory?That is a question our reporters and columnists have been answering this week as Elon Musk ramps up his involvement in the US presidential election. Musk has been giving away millions of dollars to voters in swing states who sign a petition tied to his political action committee (Pac). Oliver Laughland watched the potentially illegal spectacle play out in Pittsburgh on Sunday.The most obvious answer to what Musk wants, wrote Blake Montgomery, tech editor for Guardian US (and the new author of our TechScape newsletter), is a dramatic burst of deregulation in the US and beyond. That point was made clear in this analysis by Nick Robins-Early and Rachel Leingang, two Guardian US reporters who specialise in the threat of mis- and disinformation. The pair looked at how Musk has ploughed millions into Republican campaigns and used his 202m-follower X account as a megaphone to promote Trump. On Politics Weekly America, Rachel and host Jonathan Freedland considered how culture wars play into why Elon Musk needs Trump to win, and Adam Gabbatt and Lucy Hough discussed Musk’s millions on our must-listen daily Election Extra podcast too.Blake revealed this week how Musk’s pro-Trump Pac is pouring millions into Facebook ads, while Hugo Lowell exposed some potentially bad news for Trump’s campaign, revealing claims that canvassers working for Musk’s America Pac may not have knocked on the doors they claimed to.None of this is what those of us who believe in democracy, equality and a fairer distribution of wealth would want, and it’s our journalistic challenge to hold the world’s richest man to account. As Marina Hyde put it: “There have been vested interests as long as there has been US politics, of course. But no robber baron of the Gilded Age was ever this relatively rich, or as artlessly open about what – and whom – a relatively tiny amount of money can buy.”This week Tesla’s profits jumped again, making Musk even richer and even more powerful. Our scrutiny of Musk over the past few years has certainly caught his attention (he has called the Guardian “insufferable” alongside other much ruder messages) – and our editorial endorsement of Kamala Harris this week won’t have helped on that front. But while the former president has a man worth $250bn in his corner, we have readers like you. If you can afford to support the Guardian today, please do.
The 2024 Election is a struggle between democracy and not democracy. It is not an election between political parties of a free people living in a Republic.
“One of the great ironies of how democracies die is that the very defense of democracy is often used as a pretext for its subversion. Would-be autocrats often use economic crises, natural disasters, and especially security threats—wars, armed insurgencies, or terrorist attacks—to justify antidemocratic measures.” ― Steven Levitsky, How Democracies Die: What History Reveals About Our Future
As if we have no creative gene, our major media outlets are giving autocrats, known as MAGAS, equal air time and legitimizjng them in an illusion of discussing policies and issues. Policies of authoritarinism are presented as a legitimate party platform and discussed on national television as the choice American voters must decide between.
Presenting the American public with the appearance that the “issues” are about the economy and the border is insanity. I expect our media to be free enough to educate the public by telling the truth and nothing but the truth.
Tonight is a debate between Tim Walz and a so-called VP candidate. This is normalization of evil.
What will become of us when we cannot discern the truth of this moment?
Today a new audio version of Timothy Snyder’s On Tyranny, originally published in 2017, is available on Audible . In this version of the book, Dr. Snyder speaks directly to the threat of Trump, his actions that spread misinformation and manipulate groups which are features of authoritarian leaders.
**At the end of reading the new version, Snyder continues to explain Ukrainian and Russian history to give readers in the U.S. a broader framework to understand why the Ukrainian fight for freedom is so important. He illustrates how the lessons in On Tyranny play out in the actions of Ukrainians. He goes further to gives vital lessons on Ukrainian and Russian history – his academic focus at Yale. Dr. Snyder is a distinguished historian at Yale University. Many of his public lectures on the roots of authoritarianism are on YouTube. This one is at Prose and Politics bookstore on the release of On Tyranny. Just search on YouTube and dozens of lectures will be available to you.
Get On Tyranny. It is a small (5″ by 5″), short exposition on 20 Lessons on Tyranny from the 20th century for all Americans to consider what we can do to strengthen democracy here in the U.S.A.
Together with a pocket constitution we will gain greater discernment of the complex political and social forces that swirl about us and act.
Susan Feathers 